Portrait of Harry Hine

Part of a collection of 14 works donated to Brighton Museum and Art Gallery.

Arthur and Helen Grogan presented a total of 167 works to nine museums through the Art Fund. The Grogans are two architects with a passion for British 19th- and 20th century works  paintings, drawings, ceramics and decorative. They became tenants of the National Trust property Standen in West Sussex designed by William Morriss friend Philip Webb and lovingly recreated it as an Arts and Crafts family home. The house was the perfect setting for the Pre-Raphaelite and New English Art Club pictures they already had, and they continued to buy, always with an eye to what would suit the rooms. When the Grogans relinquished their tenancy, they donated several works to Standen and others formed part of this large gift.

Among a host of Art Funded works at the museum, Walter Richard Sickert's oil painting Brighton Pierrots (1915), part of the Tate Collection, reflects well the local and international significance of the gallery. Sickert watched the eponymous theatre troupe on the Brighton seafront every evening for five weeks, making drawings in preparation for the final work.

The sense of loneliness which pervades the painting is characteristic of Sickert's late work. The effect is amplified by the presence of empty deckchairs, reminding us that the scene was captured during World War I.

Part of the Romano-British collection, the bronze Statuette of a stag dates from the first century AD. A rare piece, it was discovered just north of Brighton by an enthusiast with a metal detector. An Art Fund grant of £7,644 helped to save the sculpture from being exported.